Time, Time, Time
by piper maru duchovny
Summary: Today is Lindsay's getting older day and she spends the morning travelling down memory lane with her best friend. Established AU. Lindsay and Austin.


**Just a little diddy for my best friend, everyone's favorite writer, the queen of the moss 'verse, Rachel's birthday. Happy getting older day, beef-ef. I love you so much and without you I wouldn't even be here to write these things. Also, I know you had plans for this song but I couldn't help myself (The title is also stolen from another Sugarland song. We're big fans of Sugarland, readers). Je t'aime! Te amo! I love you, Mama Goat!**

**Disclaimer: I truly, sadly, deeply don't own a thing. **

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><p><em>Today's my birthday and all that I want,<em>  
><em>Is to dig through this big box of pictures,<em>  
><em>In my kitchen 'til the daylight's gone<em>  
><em>-'Very Last Country Song' by Sugarland<em>

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><p>The cold from the night before still clings to the floorboards of their apartment in the early morning light while the coffee percolates and the bread toasts. She stands on her tiptoes in front of the open hall closet with her eyes scanning the piles of boxes that fill it to the brim before she finds the one she needs at the very top; she has to stand on the edge of the bottom row and she almost falls when she finally gets it down. A thin layer of dust covers the cardboard and a sneeze tickles the tip of her nose as she wanders back to the kitchen table where the birthday card and flowers from her husband sit.<p>

"Linds," Austin Messer called as she stepped through the unlocked front door. "This is Manhattan not Montana. Lock your damn door."

"Old habits die hard." She smiled and used her mailbox key to cut the packing tape on the box.

Austin's arms wrap around her from behind in a split second hug before she lets go. "Happy birthday."

"Thanks." Lindsay's eyes rake over her best friend in hopes of getting a read on her emotions. The past few weeks had been hard but today a small smile found it's way to her face and she didn't look like she had cried herself to sleep the night before – to anyone else she would seem fine but Lindsay saw the hand that still ghosted over her lower abdomen and the lip chapped from teeth that couldn't stop worrying the brittle skin. "You getting any sleep?"

The brunette shrugged and placed a small gift on the table. "It's your birthday."

"Yes, it is." She grabbed her mug and the candy red one with a chip in the handle that Austin was so very fond of. Coffee almost breaching it's ceramic boundaries, she carried them carefully over to where Austin sat before sliding into the chair across from her.

"So," the detective spoke softly, "what's in the box?"

"Memories. Ghosts. Angels." Lindsay shrugged.

She smiled a true smile for a split second. "May I see?"

"Of course." Lindsay pulled a scrapbook from the box and scooted her chair over to sit by Austin. The leather beneath her fingers was worn and soft to the touch and across the front her favorite quote from Dolly Parton was inscribed. _"Find out who you are and do it on purpose." _

The pages had yellowed with the years and a few of them stuck together from tears and sticky fingers. On the first page was little Lindsay on her first birthday, naked as the day she came into the world, standing at the sink with cake smeared across her face waiting for her bath. There were several more of her sink bath and birthday party. Austin laughed sharply and pulled half the book to rest of the edge of her knee. "Oh, Lin."

"Shush you." Lindsay chuckled in spite of herself. "I was stinkin' cute."

"You was stinkin' – period."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah." She feigned sarcasm but was grateful to provide her friend with a much needed distraction.

Austin leaned in to read what Lindsay's father had scrawled beside the pictures. "Lindsay's first birthday. Eli was excited to shove his sister into the cake, as per tradition, but was deeply disappointed when Lindsay dove in face first."

"I beat that snot at his own game."

"You sure are something."

They sat at the table until the coffee grew cold and the book grew to a close after Lindsay's eighteenth birthday. Austin sat at the table while Lindsay moved to wash their mugs; a crinkled, yellow piece of notebook paper was taped to the back cover and she had to bring the book close to her nose to read it because she had left her reading glasses at home.

_I, Lindsay Monroe, at eighteen years of age make this record of my life thus far. _

_In six thousand five hundred and seventy days (give or take a few leap years) _

_Starting at the beginning, I broke my nose when Jake was teaching me to walk by taking a header into the dining room table. _

_My fourth birthday was the year I learned to ride a bike without training wheels and got my first horse. _

_When I was five, the girls and I met on the very first day of kindergarten and would remain the best of friends until two summers ago. Not a day goes by when I don't miss them. _

_For my seventh birthday I received the chicken pox and Patsy Cline on cassette from my Granny. _

_I got my first job being Riley's slave for a week when I was nine. _

_Year ten was the first year my 4H projects made it to the state fair and Daddy took me to see George Strait all the way in Wyoming even though Mama through a fit because I had to miss school. _

_Twelve was filled with my first year at summer camp, learning to drive the tractor, and my first kiss. _

_When I was fourteen, my daddy taught me and all the girls how to drive in the ol' jeep on the back forty. My feet could hardly reach the pedals and the floorboard was hot beneath my bare feet. _

_Fifteen meant getting my permit, starting high school, and my very last year with the girls. And, though we didn't know it would be the end, we made the very best of it. We spent so many nights sneaking out after curfew, tipping cows, and three road trips with no supervision. _

_Sixteen was hard but it had some good times. Nights at the pool hall and my first real drink of strawberry wine. _

_Seventeen was better left forgotten. _

_Today I am eighteen years old. Today I got my first tattoo. Today Daddy placed my last birthday picture in this album (thanks to the hour photo that the town just got). Today I am an adult. _

_I don't know what the future holds but I hope it's full of laughter, love, new friends, new places, and a man who loves me as much as daddy loves mama. I hope... _

"I love you." Austin states it simply when she shuts the book and sits it on the kitchen table before turning to look at her best friend. "Truly, Lin."

"Love you too, Austin."

The brunette grabbed the wrapped package from the table and held it out to her. "Open it. Please."

"Sure." Lindsay dropped her rag in the sink and walked back over to her chair, swiveling it so she can sit in it backwards. Her nail hooked under the edge of the wrapping and she undid it carefully. "You wrap this yourself."

She nodded. "Pretty sure that it's held together by pure luck."

A handful of cassettes fell into her hand and she looked over each one as if they were bricks of pure gold; Loretta Lynn, Johnny Cash, and Patsy Cline. "Austin?"

"I'm sure you probably have them but, really, no one buys cassettes anymore and you always tell me that I need to listen to country music. So, I thought we could listen to them together and you can teach me which ones are the good ones."

Lindsay grabbed Austin's wrist and pulled her in the direction of the living room where the only cassette player was. "We'll start with Patsy."

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><p><em>If every road led back home<em>  
><em>This would be the very last country song <em>


End file.
